It felt a little too familiar at TD Garden Tuesday night - and not in a good way for the Celtics.
Boston fans didn’t need a reminder of last spring’s collapse in the Eastern Conference semifinals, but they got one anyway. The Knicks, who famously erased back-to-back 20-point deficits in that series, nearly pulled off another heist.
Down 18 in the second half, New York stormed back behind a red-hot stretch from Mikal Bridges, whose three-point barrage sliced the lead to just three. And just to make sure everyone in green knew exactly who was cooking, Bridges let the Celtics bench hear about it after every make.
The energy in the building shifted. You could feel the tension - not just from the fans, but from the Celtics themselves. The question was clear: would this team fold again when the pressure hit, or had it finally found a backbone?
This time, Boston didn’t try to outshoot a team that suddenly couldn’t miss. Instead, they dug in.
They leaned on hustle, toughness, and a little bit of pride. It wasn’t about matching the Knicks bucket for bucket - it was about making the kind of plays that don’t show up in the box score but win you games in May and June.
Loose ball dives. Defensive rotations that clicked.
Scrappy rebounds. Smart fouls.
The Celtics didn’t panic - they responded. And that response, especially in a game that started to mirror one of their most painful recent memories, might tell us more about this team’s ceiling than any blowout win ever could.
This wasn’t a night for style points. It was about grit. And for a Celtics squad still carrying the scars of last postseason, that might be exactly what they needed.